The Unforgettable
by Lilian Swan
Summary: Even with each passing year, can they ever forget?


Can you ever really forget?

Time passed and seasons changed and eventually every student who made it through the Calamity of that year would begin to move on. Their memories would grow dimmer and dimmer until only bits and pieces remained, and then even those bits and pieces would become covered up.

But can you ever _really_ forget?

What memories would there be to mask those having been erased? How can one live with a giant black gap of nothing sitting in the midst of their life story?

They don't. Because those memories don't disappear. They linger. They linger and wait like butterflies being trapped inside a cage. And then one day they escape. One by one, not at the same time, but in intervals. And with them they bring a flash of something, but what _is_ that something? It nags and nags until the person either gets consumed by it or they find better things to worry about.

But still, eventually, Another would appear.

It could come in a note. Perhaps a crumbled up, messily hand-written note that one could have picked up from the very bottom of their old backpack? From there ninth grade year?

Or a doll? A doll one could find in the bottom of a workshop they finally decided to revisit for a sudden impulsive reason?

A tape-recording, maybe? One found in the inside of an old-closet that once ended up being the savoir to that very individual? But that would surely mess with their heads.

Or maybe it's just in a casual occurrence. A meeting with someone you didn't expect to see in a particular location at a particular time.

Several years after the disaster of his ninth grade year, Kouichi Sakakibara felt the wind ripple through his shirt and his hair blow in his face as he passed a familiar looking riverbank. It felt weird, going back to such a place. But, for what reason, he couldn't quite explain. A few months after the Calamity was over, he was gone and living back in Tokyo. Mei too, was with him.

Going away had helped. To 'forget' it all, that was. His mind became focused on other things in the busy metropolis, but yet it was like some unknown force always drew him back here.

This time is was his grandfather. Old, senile, they called him. And he'd spent his last few years mourning over the people he had lost.

But now, thinking back on all that had brought him back here, he felt a sudden lump in his throat. This event...It felt all too familiar. The funeral, and not just that. Taking this path by the riverbank, he felt as if something here had happened. But what- he couldn't quite recall.

"Oh!" He felt something hard hit the back of his head. Looking up at the ground, he saw an empty soda can.

"Huh..?" He began to feel light-headed as he bent down to pick it up, almost as if something was tugging at the back of his mind.

"Oh my gosh, I'm so sorry!" He could hear a girl's voice call from behind, and not a moment later she was standing right beside him.

What he saw when he looked at her made him gasp.

She had long, reddish-brown hair tied up in two ponytails that were held up by blue ribbons, and fox-like brown eyes.

It was her expression though. So familiar, and yet so far away all at the same time. He _knew _this girl. He absolutely had to.

"Um...Have we met before?" His words sounded so far away, and his eyes had a glossy look to them.

"Wha- ...Oh, no." She replied weakly, a surprised tone to her voice, "I'm not from around here, actually."

"Oh...My mistake," Kouichi looked away, knowing that somewhere he had known such a girl.

"I did have a cousin!" She suddenly piped up, "Well, a distant cousin...She passed away though," Her eyes glanced downward as a sad expression came to her eyes, "A couple of years ago. She was in the ninth grade."

And at that very moment, it all came back to him. In a flash, just for a few milliseconds, it all flared by his eyes. Every single detail of that year seemed to come back to him. Every death, every person killed off; until at last he came to the death of the last student he had seen that vengeful night. Chills raced up his spine, and he suddenly felt like he would just fall apart at any second.

Wildly, much to the girl's shock, he grabbed her hand and held it for a moment with an almost yearning, lost expression on his face.

"I remember, Izumi, I remember."


End file.
